


Epiphany

by CaptainLeBubbles



Series: Perry T Platypus [1]
Category: Phineas and Ferb
Genre: Background Character Death, Emotional Infidelity, Gen, Human Perry the Platypus (Phineas and Ferb), Other Additional Tags to Be Added, Pining, Slow Burn, Unresolved Emotional Tension
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-06
Updated: 2019-04-10
Packaged: 2020-01-05 22:45:32
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 9,387
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18375608
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/CaptainLeBubbles/pseuds/CaptainLeBubbles
Summary: It would be inaccurate to say that Perry T Platypus has never formed strong attachments, but it would be fair to say that the twenty years he spent as OWCA’s roving lone wolf didn’t exactly lend itself to having many of them, especially of the romantic variety. It should therefore be of no surprise that when he begins to develop feelings for, of all people, his nemesis, he… doesn’t exactly realize it immediately.Or at all.





	1. Duality

**Author's Note:**

> Well! Okay first things first, for my regular readers: One Large Family is officially on hiatus until I start feeling RWBY again, probably late summer or early fall we'll see what happens. In the meantime enjoy the Perry T stuff.
> 
> Anyway! Welcome to the Perry T verse. Verse notes to get y'all up to speed really quickly:
> 
> -Perry T Platypus. I know what the T stands for; Heinz thinks it's The. (It is not.)  
> -Perry lives in the Flynn-Fletcher house as a boarder; he took on when they were just starting the shop, to pad their income, and just never left. The kids call him Uncle Perry because they love him.  
> -His cover is that he's a writer (they don't do much) and thanks to Inator shenanigans, everyone thinks he writes bad gay smut novels. Since this leads to no one wanting to question him too hard, this actually lends itself to his cover very well.  
> -Perry and Heinz are both trans in this verse but again, thanks to Inator shenanigans, it's a bit moot at this point. It may or may not ever come up, but I'm still putting it out there so the audience knows.  
> -Jacked(tm)
> 
> Okay yeah I think that's it! This fic is the first of several I have planned that will cover the length of the summer and the breadth of Perry's pining for Heinz; it's a slow burn that will necessarily last the entire series so strap in and be patient and hope I keep my attention span long enough to write the whole darn thing. Okay have fun. (Images in the end notes, this one is getting kind of long.)
> 
> Tags will be updated with each part posted.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The day of Agent T’s memorial, Perry has a paradigm shift with his nemesis.

-/-

It started in November, though Perry wouldn’t realize this till later.

(At the time, he didn’t realize much of anything. Tom was  _ gone _ , and that was all he cared about. He’d gotten complacent in Danville; agents didn’t really tend to… fall… in Danville. Losing Tom had been - a shock. For all of them. Even for the evil scientists, who sometimes forgot that their nemeses weren’t indestructible. His first day back on the job even Doofenshmirtz had forgone his usual curses for an invitation to just sit and watch tv.)

(And if he’d had a small emotional meltdown on that couch, well, both of them had agreed to never speak of it again. Some things were best left to the stale comfort of the status quo.)

But ignoring things didn’t make them didn’t happen, and even small pebbles can create big ripples.

In June, these ripples began to show themselves.

It started at breakfast on the day of Agent T’s six-month memorial.

-/-

Perry had spent the better part of the past five years cultivating a specific image for himself as “Cool Uncle Perry”, so when the boys barrelled into the kitchen at practically dawn calling cheery and excited greetings only to receive a half-hearted shrug from Perry, currently pushing biscuits and gravy around his plate because even mustering the energy to eat them seemed pretty pie in the sky-

-well, they were  _ gonna _ notice.

And it wasn’t that Cool Uncle Perry wasn’t allowed to be upset or down or bothered or anything, obviously he was, it was just that quite naturally the boys wanted to know what was wrong, and he couldn’t  _ tell _ them.

So he waved away their concerned faces with an absent hand, and wondered what he was going to do today, since circumstances had allowed him a day off.

-/-

He didn’t have anything better to do, so he went out to lie in the hammock and listen to the boys plan their day. Maybe the distraction would help.

About ten minutes after he settled down, they came over to join him, sitting on the edge of the hammock when he scooted over to give them space.

“Are you sure everything’s okay, Uncle Perry?” Phineas said. “I mean, you seem really down. Is there anything we can do?”

Perry looked between the two boys, and shook his head. He supposed he could always tell them he was dealing with a loss, but then they’d want to know who. They’d want to know how. He’d have to write them off by implying that it was someone simultaneously not that important to him, and also very, very important to him, and how did he begin that?

It was just  _ easier _ if they didn’t know  _ anything _ .

He considered the situation for a moment, then set each of them on the ground and waved them away. He wasn’t going to let his mood get in the way of their fun, and he never got to hang out with them for their schemes anyway.

They gave him one last searching look, then nodded as one.

“Okay, Uncle Perry,” Phineas said, and then reached out to grab Ferb’s shoulder in excitement. “Ferb, I know what we’re gonna do today!”

And then pulled his brother aside and began whispering, leaving Perry to go back to his solitude and wonder what they were planning.

-/-

His watch going off was almost welcome because it gave him something to keep his mind off of things- whatever the boys were planning, they were being very secretive about it- but by the time he got down to his lair the lead weight in his middle had sapped him of all of his energy to even  _ care _ what Doofenshmirtz was up to. He was  _ supposed _ to have the day off; hadn’t his nemesis gotten the memo? All the  _ other _ evil scientists had agreed to the day of amnesty, why did  _ he _ have to get the difficult one?

“Good morning, Agent P.” 

Monogram looked more somber than usual; Perry gave him a weary salute and slumped down in his chair.

“I’m, uh, sorry to bother you  _ today _ , Agent P, it’s just that… well, Dr. Doofenshmirtz is at it again. You know how he is. So, uh. Go get him, I guess.”

Perry didn’t bother taking any of the many flashy lair exits that he usually got a thrill out of. He didn’t even have it in him for  _ that _ . He just saluted, then padded over to his jetpack and headed out.

-/-

The cage dropping down on him when he let himself into Doofenshmirtz Evil Incorporated was too much to care about: Perry sighed and settled down to wait. He’d let Doofenshmirtz get his monologue out, then escape and destroy the inator of the day, then go home and- whatever. It wasn’t like it  _ mattered _ .

Doofenshmirtz got three words into his monologue before he realized Perry’s heart wasn’t in it. He huffed and leaned one arm on the cage.

“You know, Perry the Platypus, I can’t help noticing you’re kind of just  _ phoning it in _ today. What’s up?”

Nice of him to care. Perry rolled his eyes and thrust the notice at him with a glare. Doofenshmirtz took it and skimmed it; his eyes widened once he had.

“Agent T’s memorial? That’s  _ today _ ? Oh my gosh, Perry the Platypus, I- I’m so  _ sorry _ , I got my days mixed up! Here, let’s get you out of that cage.” He pushed the release button on the trap and reached out a hand to help Perry up; once Perry was on his feet, Doofenshmirtz gave him a light shove toward the kitchen. “Come on, I’ll make sandwiches, we can have lunch. What do you think? You want to talk about it, or sit there staring off into space while I talk about literally anything else?”

He clapped a friendly hand on Perry’s shoulder as they walked; Perry eyed him sidelong, and gave him a weak smile. The first one, definitely. But after that, maybe the second.

-/-

Doofenshmirtz made them both sandwiches, and then filled the silence while they ate- he was telling Perry about this new telanovela he’d gotten into, filling him in on how the multiple storylines wove together, and Perry was even half-listening to it. It made him feel better in an odd sort of way.

His nemesis didn’t  _ have _ to do that. Doofenshmirtz was a notoriously self-absorbed man; it wouldn’t have been out of character for him to take advantage of Perry’s lack of focus or concern to pull off something big, and instead-

Perry finished off his sandwich and made a decision- he took out his wallet and began rummaging through it until he found what he wanted.

Doofenshmirtz stopped talking when a photo was thrust into his line of sight. He broke off and took it.

“What’s this- oh, is this from your academy days? Awww, look at you, Perry the Platypus, you were so little, so young! So less jacked…”

Perry snorted and rolled his eyes, then pointed at the other subject in the photo, the one that Doofenshmirtz had ignored.

“This other guy? Wait- is that-?”

Perry nodded. He handed Doofenshmirtz a second photo, this one from his graduation.

“Wow.” Doofenshmirtz looked from one photo to the other. “You and Agent T go way back, huh?”

He nodded again, took the photos back. In fact they went back even farther than that, but that wasn’t for Doofenshmirtz to know, even if Perry did feel comfortable sharing it.

“Yeesh, no wonder you’re so down.”

There was a brief silence there, in which Perry was careful not to move or give away anything on his mind, and then he said, “Monogram wants me to speak at the memorial.”

“What?!”

“I knew him longest, and I’m the best. He thinks I’m the most appropriate choice.”

“But I mean- I mean he does  _ know _ you don’t like speaking in front of crowds, right?”

Perry shrugged. Monogram knew, he just also knew that Perry would probably do it anyway, if he was ordered to. Never mind what he was comfortable with.

“Man, and he thinks  _ I’m _ evil. You want to borrow my pocket awayinator? No? Fair enough. Probably too evil for a goody two-shoes like you.”

Perry gave him a fond half-smile, and reached over to rest a hand over Doofenshmirtz’s arm, just for a moment, before pulling it away. Times like these, he really appreciated his nemesis.

-/-

It was a nice memorial. 

Monogram didn’t have to order Perry to speak; he at least would have it be on his own account. He didn’t give much of a speech, though. Not that they were expecting one.

“Agent T was my friend,” he said, staring out at the crowd and wishing he could tell them everything Agent T was. “I miss him.”

They all agreed it was a good eulogy.

After Perry a lot of other people said a lot of other nice things about Tom, pretty words and feelings that he would have been touched to hear, and his memorial bust was given its place of honor among the other memorial busts, and they all had finger sandwiches and ginger ale and when all was said and done, a lot of agents went out to drink themselves sober at the bar nearest headquarters*.

Perry wasn’t among them. He wasn’t much of a drinker at the best of times, and drinking wasn’t one of the ways he liked to cope with loss anyway. Instead he went home, thoughts longingly pulling him toward his kids, and their wild tales of the things they’d done while he was out.

The house was dark when he got home, but lights and noise in the backyard drew him back there. It looked like half the neighborhood was here: his family, along with the kids’ friends and some of their parents, all gathered around a long table eating grilled hamburgers and enjoying each other’s company. The yard itself was lit up nicely by string lights, and a speaker setup in the corner was playing soft music, just enough to be ambient but not enough to overpower the conversation.

It looked so nice. He wondered what it had looked like before the mysterious force dragged away the big dangerous stuff. It wouldn’t have been Doofenshmirtz’s inator today, so something else would have needed to intervene to keep the boys out of trouble.

For just a few minutes, he was content to stand there leaning on the gate, watching his family and friends enjoy themselves, but it was only so long before Phineas looked up and spotted him. His usually-smiling face lit up even more.

“There you are, Uncle Perry!” He hurried over and took Perry’s hand. “Everyone, look who finally made it!”

They all paused their conversation to share the greeting; Perry’s eyes widened, and he looked to Phineas to beg an explanation.

“We know you were feeling really down this morning,” Phineas said, pulling Perry over to one of the seats. “We wanted to cheer you up, but since we didn’t really know what was wrong, we had to improvise.”

“So we set up a nice dinner for your closest family and friends to come hang out with you,” Candace said, setting a plate in front of him.

Phineas brought him his drink, and added, “We figure even if we don’t know what’s wrong, maybe just being there for you will be enough to cheer you up.”

“Also because the warm fuzzies room got up and walked away,” Ferb added.

Oh  _ god _ Perry was going to  _ cry _ . His emotions were already in the hamper after the memorial; he didn’t need this.

Or- maybe he did. He raised his arms and pulled all three into a hug, burying his face in the nearest head of hair and trying not to cry literally  _ on _ them.

“Thanks,” he murmured, low enough that only they could hear him. “Really, thanks.”

-/-

It was late when everyone left and they got the backyard cleaned up. Perry was feeling better after letting the comforting presence of his loved ones tidal wave over him, and at this point all he really wanted was to sleep, but he had something else he had to take care of. So as soon as everyone was quiet in their own rooms his slipped away.

The motorcycle was his personal vehicle. It was a risk to take it, but he didn’t want to use any of his OWCA vehicles for this. Besides, he suspected that Doofenshmirtz’s inability to recognize him without his hat would extend to not recognize this bike without Perry literally on it… in his hat.

Doofenshmirtz answered the door in his pajamas; he stared sleepily at Perry when he saw who it was banging on his door.

“It’s the middle of the night, Perry the Platypus. Come back tomorrow, it’s too late for thwarting.” He stifled a yawn in his sleeve, and then stiffened when Perry surged forward and threw his arms around him. “Um… Perry the Platypus?”

“Thank you,” Perry said, muffled in Doofenshmirtz’s shoulder. “For earlier, I mean. You didn’t have to.”

There was a brief moment where Doofenshmirtz didn’t seem to know what to do with his hands, and then he brought them up to wrap around Perry in return. He patted Perry’s shoulder.

“Come on, Perry the Platypus, I’m  _ evil _ , but I’m not a  _ monster _ .”

Perry nodded into his shoulder, continuing the hug well past the point that it should be comfortable, but not wanting to let go quite yet. Doofenshmirtz patted him again.

“Don’t- don’t think this  _ changes _ anything. I’m still your nemesis, as soon as you get here tomorrow I’m launching the soggybunsinator and I won’t put it off a second time!”

Perry gave him one last squeeze, and took a step back. He tipped his hat. “I wouldn’t have it any other way, Doc.”

-/-


	2. Polarity

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Perry takes awhile to trust Dr. D again, after Peter.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Something I forgot to mention in the verse notes last chapter, about Perry's speech: the route I've chosen to take is that he can speak, he's just remarkably picky about who he speaks in front of and when and where and how much. Any other time, he relies on non-linguistic communication, ie gestures and expressions. Only the Flynn-Fletchers, Dr. Doofenshmirtz, and Vanessa know how chatty he really is.
> 
> He also still makes what the boys refer to as 'Perry Noises'; it's a kind of verbal tic of his, and people get used to it pretty quickly.

-/-

“Boy, Uncle Perry, if looks could kill, we wouldn’t need a lawn mower.”

Perry paused on the -up of his push-up, carefully wiping the ire from his face to look up at Phineas and Ferb, and then beyond them to the golden dawn light cast by the rising sun. He hadn’t even noticed that the sun had come up.

He had slept fitfully the night before, and then not at all, and when it had become apparent that he wasn’t going to get any rest, he’d come out into the backyard to get in his morning workout early.

Unfortunately, his attempt to clear his head had merely focused his mind on the thing that was bothering him, and he’d ended up glowering at the yard, imagining Peter Panda’s face on every blade of grass, imagining each one spontaneously combusting with the force of his glare.

...okay, so maybe he was starting to understand where Dr. D was coming from with some of his inators. He certainly wouldn’t mind using an inator on Peter, or just his fists for that matter.

“Do you wanna talk about it?” Phineas asked, as he and Ferb climbed up onto Perry’s back. It was a habit of theirs; they’d started when they were small, and kept it up as they got bigger.  He waited for them to settle and then started back down, trusting them to understand his silence when he didn’t reply.

“I guess you don’t have to talk about it, but it really isn’t healthy to bottle things up. They could end up exploding.” A glance at Ferb, and he added, “But not literally. Probably.”

He graced them with a reassuring chitter at that, and then paused on another -up when Linda came to the backdoor. 

“I’m heading out to my Jazz group rehearsals,” she said. “You gonna be around today, Perry?”

Perry swapped to one hand and shrugged with the other. Who knew whether Dr. D would have a scheme today, and for that matter who knew whether he wouldn’t just get  _ Peter _ to thwart him if he did?

“All right, well let Candace know if you’re leaving. Candace!” 

She turned back into the house, leaving Perry to continue his push-ups while Phineas discussed potential plans for the day with Ferb. For some reason Phineas was only speaking on the rise of each pushup, so Perry started entertaining himself by breaking his rhythm, cutting Phineas’s sentences off for a few beats longer just to see if he’d keep up his gag, then holding so he could at least get a whole sentence out.

“He’s making jokes,” Phineas said, and on the next rise, “so that means he’s,” and then another long pause, “Feeling better.”

Perry chittered a warning, then raised himself up to a sitting position, the boys clinging to his back like a couple of baby monkeys. Once he was seated, they tumbled over his shoulders to land in his lap.

“Are you going to hang out with us today?” Phineas asked.

Perry shrugged, but even as he did his watch beeped at him. He sighed.

“Aww, does that mean you have to go?”

He nodded, and set each boy carefully aside before standing and brushing himself off. They looked disappointed, which he couldn’t blame them for since he had also rather liked the idea of staying with them.

On the other hand, it was for the best that he and Dr. D tried to get back to normal as quickly as possible, lest his nemesis feel the need to seek thwarting outside of their nemesiship once more.

“You’ll come back once you hit your word count, right?”

Perry nodded, and made a crossing motion over his heart before heading inside. On his way by Candace’s door, he knocked twice, then disappeared into his room just as her own door flew open and he heard her call down to the yard, “That means I’m in cha~arge!”

-/-

Monogram was already on the screen when Perry dropped into his chair. He frowned in disapproval.

“Agent P, you are  _ not _ in uniform.”

Perry looked down at himself, and chittered a swear; he was still in the sweat-soaked tank top and sweatpants he’d been wearing to work out in. He held up a finger, and set his hat very deliberately onto his head. Monogram brightened immediately.

“Much better, Agent P. Professionalism is important around here, you know that.”

Perry shrugged. Sure, why not.

“Onto business,” Monogram went on. “Dr. Doofenshmirtz has been buying up umbrellas and meteorological equipment. We don’t know what this means, so go find out, and put a stop to it.” He paused and added, a little uncomfortably, “We’ve, uh, been assured that Peter Panda is back in Seattle, so… there shouldn’t be any worry about him, uh… well… you know…”

Perry rolled his eyes, then saluted and took off.

-/-

Generally Perry liked kicking down Dr. D’s door, or bursting through right beside the door, but today he used his key to let himself in. He wasn’t going to waste a good door-kicking if it meant coming in to find Peter Panda doing  _ his _ job.

Dr. D was putting some last minute touches on his inator of the day when Perry came in. He looked up from his work and over to Perry, then over to the window, where a large weighted net was ready to fall. He looked back at Perry.

“You used the door today,” he said, and then looked Perry up and down and added, “Did you get even  _ more _ jacked?”

Perry raised an eyebrow at that, then looked down and smacked himself in the forehead. He’d forgotten to change before leaving his lair; he was  _ still _ in his workout clothes.

“Yeah yeah, whatever, hold on.” Dr. D disappeared into the next room and came out carrying some of Perry’s clothes folded over his arm. “Here, I had these cleaned after the last time you left them here. Go on.”

Perry took the clothes and raised one hand, turning his finger in one pointed circle.

Dr. D rolled his eyes and turned around. “All right, fine. Yeesh, so  _ modest _ . It’s not like I haven’t  _ seen _ you in your underwear already, you know.”

Perry ignored this in favor of changing clothes, and Dr. D was silent for a record-breaking seven seconds before he began speaking again.

“So, as long as we’re having this little interlude, Perry the Platypus, I just wanted to say that I’m sorry about yesterday. I know I said this already on that Dr. Feelbetter thing but- you know, that wasn’t- I mean, I think I sort of gave you the impression that was all for some scheme and it wasn’t, I was speaking from the heart there, the scheme was sort of- sort of  _ last minute _ , just taking advantage of the situation, you know? But I really am sorry. I never meant to hurt you in that specific way. I just thought- you know, I thought-”

He peeked around; Perry was just doing up his tie, and when he saw Dr. D looking, he finished adjusting it and held up a thumbs up.

“Well, I guess it doesn’t matter what I thought because now you’re trapped!”

-as a rope dropped around Perry and lifted him up, hanging him upside down by the legs. He chittered.

“Interlude over?”

Perry nodded.

“Then be _ hold _ , Perry the Platypus! The  _ umbrellinator _ !”

-/-

Perry came into the backyard to find the boys and their friends sitting under a comically large beach umbrella in their bathers eating fudge bars, Candace stammering something about a giant inner tube, and Linda remarking that she’d left her purse at rehearsal and needed to go back and get it. He grinned, and came up to crouch by the umbrella.

“Hey guys, what’d I miss?”

The kids’ faces lit up. “There you are, Uncle Perry!” Phineas said. “We made a giant river rafting ride! It was so cool, you should have seen it!”

“Sounds like a blast,” he said, as Ferb passed him a fudge bar.

“Are you feeling better?” Isabella asked, scooting over so he could stretch out in the shade with them. “Phineas said that you were really upset this morning.”

He shrugged, and nodded. Dr. D had apologized- really apologized- and they’d fought and he’d thwarted him, and things were back to normal now. And Peter was in Seattle where he belonged. Everything was  _ fine _ now.

-/-

According to the tracker, Dr. Doofenshmirtz was en route to Seattle.

That could mean anything, of course. There was a thriving evil scientist community in Seattle, he could be meeting up with a colleague. He owned stock in a coffee shop chain that had locations in both Danville and Seattle, so he could just be checking up on the place to see how it was going. And Seattle was a good place to go for inator parts, so it was always possible it was just a quick parts run.

But just a few days after the whole Peter thing went down, Perry had trouble believing any of those possibilities was the reason.

-/-

Perry dropped his bike off at OWCA’s Seattle headquarters. True, it was slightly paranoid of him, but he didn’t trust his bike to another city, and tailing Dr. D would be easier on foot.

He was just dropping off the keys with Seattle’s Agent S- a far more cheerful guy than Danville’s rather grumpy Sergei- when he turned around and ran smack into Peter Panda. He rubbed irritably at his nose and glared; Peter stared impassively back at him.

For a long moment that was it, the two agents staring at each other in silence (Agent S in the background, looking between them excitedly), and then Peter pointed over at the door. Perry nodded, albeit still annoyed, and followed. (Agent S pouted over missing the inevitable fight between two of OWCA’s best.)

-/-

Peter led Perry out of the Seattle base and into the city, and then down street after street, until they came to a coffee shop. Peter gestured for Perry to have a seat while he went to order; Perry did, still staring Peter down the whole time.

It was several minutes before he came back, setting Perry’s order in front of him and then settling into his own seat, folding his hands in front of him and returning Perry’s stare.

Perry glared and sipped. He’d read Peter’s file, knew they shared some tendencies. He’d let Peter speak first, break the silence that was bubbling between them.

Peter seemed to understand this because he did eventually speak.

“This is about Heinz, isn’t it?”

Perry chittered out a snarl at the use of Dr. D’s first name. Peter raised an eyebrow at him.

“It wasn’t personal, you know.”

Perry huffed, and folded his arms. His glare deepened.

“It  _ wasn’t _ . He was doing evil, no one was here to stop him, I stepped in. Where were you, anyway? Someone should have been stopping him.”

Perry made to answer, and then looked away, suddenly embarrassed. He  _ had _ been in Seattle to stop Dr. D at that expo… until he’d gotten a call about a more urgent case and had to chase down a couple of robbers instead.

(They’d gotten away too. Turned out that day was terrible on a lot of levels.)

Peter gave him a knowing look. “Ah yes, side missions. They get in the way of a good nemesiship, I know. But ask yourself this: if you’re allowed to have side missions, why isn’t Heinz- all right,  _ Dr. Doofenshmirtz _ \- allowed to have a side nemesis? Someone to thwart him when you’re not around to do the job properly?”

On the surface, of course, it seemed logical, but there was also… it wasn’t the  _ same _ . Perry couldn’t explain why, he just knew it wasn’t.

“Jealousy’s not a good look for you,” Peter said. He raised an eyebrow. “This isn’t about the thwarting, is it?”

Perry’s glare weakened. Of course it was about the thwarting. What else would it be about?

Peter chuckled. “I see.” He traced the rim of his cup, and shot Perry a smug look. “Do you know OWCA has no regulations about fraternization between nemeses? Specifically nemeses, mind you. You can’t fraternize with  _ other _ evil scientists but you can fraternize with  _ your _ evil scientist all you want to.”

Perry chittered at that. Seriously? Did Peter think he was mad because he wanted to- to  _ fraternize _ with Dr. D? Of course he didn’t, they were  _ nemeses _ , they  _ fought _ each other. Perry regularly left Dr. D buried under rubble or tied to rockets or being trounced by his trashed inators, and  _ always _ cursing Perry’s name. What about that translated to- to  _ fraternization _ ?

Did  _ Peter _ want to fraternize with Dr. D? Was that why he’d tried to move in on Perry’s territory? Because it was only allowed if he was his nemesis?

The idea of Peter seducing Dr. D- of being edged out to make it possible- made something unpleasant constrict in Perry’s middle. He didn’t like it, didn’t like it at all, and judging by the knowing way Peter was watching Perry, he knew it.

It wasn’t something that bore thinking about any farther. Perry stood with a chittered half-snarl, then spun on his heel and stormed out. There. Let Peter soak in  _ that _ .

-/-

Dr. D didn’t do much in Seattle. He picked up some parts, dropped in on his coffee shop, had coffee with an evil scientist in the area, and then left. He didn’t do anything evil, he didn’t try to contact Peter, he didn’t do anything that needed thwarting, ad overall-

(The quiet trip gave Perry plenty of time to think uncomfortably about Peter’s implication, until he’d managed to very carefully tuck that away where he didn’t have to think about it at all.)

-it was a perfectly innocent trip, but Perry wouldn’t have believed him if he didn’t see it for himself.

-/-

Perry made it home in time for dinner, and he sat glowering at his spaghetti while Phineas talked at length about the origami chicken farm they’d made that day. (It was unclear exactly what part of the chicken farm was origami. Perry didn’t ask.)

“Everything okay, Perry?” Lawrence asked, when Linda began passing out dessert.

Perry shoved his mostly-untouched plate away and accepted the slice of pie offered with a shrug.

“Come on now, man, something’s really bothering you. And the boys said you were upset yesterday, too.”

“You’ll feel better if you talk about it,” Linda added.

Which was true, unfortunately so. Perry considered the situation, and ate a bite of his pie to stall while he arranged the events in a way that he could share them. He’d have to fudge a few details, but he could still give them a version that would at least let them know some of what was wrong.

“I, um. I’ve got this, um, friend…” He chittered irritably, and corrected, “I mean, literally. He’s someone I spend a lot of time with, but lately I found out that-” God, this already sounded pathetic in his head. “-he has another friend, someone he’s been, um, hanging out with on the side.”

Yep, he definitely should have picked a different analog for what Dr. D was to him. Now he just sounded like he didn’t understand that his friends could have other friends.

Linda and Lawrence were exchanging knowing looks at the end of the table, while Phineas said, “Why don’t you just all hang out together? Me and Ferb and Isabella are all friends, and we hang out all three of us all the time, so no one has to feel left out or excluded.”

“Not that kind of friendship, bud,” he said, reaching over to ruffle Phineas’s hair.

Phineas gave him a confused frown, then his eyebrows raised and he said, “Ooooh, you mean it’s like when Candace doesn’t want Jeremy hanging out with other girls.”

“I don’t mind Jeremy hanging out with other girls,” Candace said. “I just don’t like when he hangs out with girls he might want to date instead of- oh you mean that kind of friend.”

Which was the unfortunate moment Perry chose to realize how his explanation must sound to his family, and slapped his palm to his forehead with a frustrated chitter. Okay, that was it, no more talking tonight. If he did he was only going to make things worse; at this rate, half the city was going to think he was sleeping with the enemy.

“Have you tried talking to your ‘um, friend’?” Linda asked. “Maybe he didn’t realize you wanted to be exclusive ‘um, friends’.”

Perry glowered down the table at her. She was very clearly amused by this; this was why it was best not to even give his family a vague idea of the things bothering him. They got the wrong idea and then he couldn’t explain how wrong they were.

“All I know is, if he’s good enough to be your ‘uh, friend’, then he’ll be unhappy that he hurt you and want to make things right,” Lawrence said. “And if he doesn’t care, then he’s not worthy of your… uh, friendship. But you can’t know unless you talk to him, either way.”

Perry, with great deliberation, pushed his pie aside and set his head very gently on the table. This was not going well at all.

-/-

Still, there was one piece of advice they’d given him that he could follow.

Showing up at Doofenshmirtz Evil Incorporated at gone midnight was becoming too regular a thing, Perry thought, setting his helmet aside and heading into the building. But this wasn’t a conversation they could have on the clock, in front of a studio audience of their colleagues, or in interludes between traps.

“Perry the Platypus?” Dr. D rubbed sleepily at his eyes and looked Perry over, taking in the reassuring open hands and the pleading look in his eyes, and shrugged. “All right, come on in.”

Perry followed him in, standing awkwardly while Dr. D shuffled over to flip on some lights before rejoining him.

“So what’s up?”

Here was the thing: Perry had come to  _ talk _ about the problem with Dr. D, but now that he was here, in the middle of the lab where they had so many of their fights, he couldn’t think what to actually  _ say _ . He raised his hands, palms up, fingers twitching a little, like he was trying to grab at words that weren’t there.

“How many times?” He found himself saying.

Dr. D raised an eyebrow at that, and then understanding dawned. “This is about Peter Panda, isn’t it?”

Perry nodded. It was always going to be about Peter Panda, until they worked it out. His expression repeated his question.

Dr. D shrugged, uncomfortable. “Not.. not  _ that _ many. There was the expo, there was the time you caught us, and between that… two? Maybe three. And once we just met for coffee because he was only passing through and I didn’t have time to get a scheme ready since I was… already…”

Perry’s habitual chitter hit a higher octave than usual, and his hands fell weakly at his side. Four times. Maybe five, and coffee. That would be- that worked out to at least once a week. How had he kept that secret? How had they kept that under wraps? And how had he failed to thwart Dr. D  _ that many times _ that his nemesis felt like he needed to be thwarted by  _ someone else _ ? That many times?

“Hey, Perry the Platypus, come over here- come here, no arguments.” Dr. D took his hand and pulled him over to the couch, pushing him to sit. “I think maybe we need to talk. This is- not- this isn’t what I was expecting from this coming out.”

Perry glowered.

“Well, you see Perry the Platypus, it’s just that I… well the first time, it was an  _ accident _ . I had the trap all set up for  _ you _ , I was waiting for you to get there, and then you never did, and the next thing you know I had Peter Panda trapped! And you know, sometimes you get called away on side missions and they send someone  _ else _ to thwart me so I just went along with it and I didn’t think anything of it because  _ obviously _ he was just a stand-in.

Perry nodded. That was fair; while he never really thought about it, they would have to send other agents to take care of Dr. D when Perry had his side missions. Some of the other agents even liked working with him, and had said as much to Perry, envying him having a nemesis who stuck to the script so well.

But none of them had  _ bothered _ him the way Peter had, and he was starting to understand why now that Dr. D had started explaining himself. Dr. D was waiting for Perry’s input, so he just waved a hand for him to keep talking.

“The next time I realized the misunderstanding, but then I kept fighting because… well…” He sighed. Perry knew they’d come to the crux of it. “It wasn’t just… a  _ job _ for him. Peter Panda was- he was thwarting me because he  _ wanted _ to, not because OWCA  _ assigned _ him to. And that was  _ nice _ , that felt  _ good _ , and I wanted to feel that again. It wasn’t because I hated you less, I just liked how it felt to be thwarted by someone who hated me  _ personally _ . I never realized you’d… I didn’t think you’d be  _ hurt _ by it.”

Perry stared. Dr. D thought this was just a  _ job _ for him? He thought he was only thwarting him because OWCA told him to? He pinched the bridge of his nose, trying to reorient reality so that this made sense.

“Doc… how can you  _ possibly _ think that you’re just a  _ job _ to me?”

“How? Because you never let me  _ in _ , Perry the Platypus! You don’t talk about your personal life or your feelings, I don’t know if you have a family or if you even have a  _ dog _ , you’re a closed book! You know  _ everything _ about my  _ entire life _ and I know  _ nothing _ about you. What was I  _ supposed _ to think?”

Ah. Well, that made sense. Perry considered how best to explain, and after a record-breaking eight seconds of silence from Dr. D, handed him the pamphlet that he was supposed to give his family if they ever uncovered his identity.

“What’s this? Some silly little pamphlet?” But Perry stared him down, so he turned his attention to it. “So you’ve just found out someone in your family is a secret agent’. Oh, it’s an OWCA thing. Let’s see… secret identity, yada yada, memory wipe, blah blah blah…  _ reassignment _ ?” He looked to Perry and then the pamphlet, then back to Perry. “Reassignment...?”

Perry nodded. He took the pamphlet back. Hopefully Dr. D would understand now.

“So… so when you don’t tell me anything about your life, it’s because blowing your cover would mean you’d have to leave?” A weak smile tugged at his lips. “You being a closed book is a way to, to stay my nemesis?”

Perry nodded again, smiling this time.

“Wow, Perry the Platypus, I- I didn’t realize.”

Perry reached over and took Dr. D’s hand, giving it a firm, meaningful squeeze.

“Oh, well, nobody’s perfect. Not even  _ you _ , Perry the Sour-Puss.” He laughed. “You like that? I was saving it for tomorrow’s trap but it seemed like a good place to use it now. No? Eh, they can’t all be winners.”

Perry laughed. He squeezed Dr. D’s hand again. Maybe… maybe he could give him  _ something _ . “...I don’t have a dog.”

“What has that got to- oh, I see.” He looked down between them. “You’re still holding my hand.”

Perry retracted his hand faster than if he’d been burnt. He held it close to his chest and chittered, suddenly unsure, and Dr. D mirrored his unsurity.

“You uh. You should probably go, Perry the Platypus. I mean!” He stood. “It’s just that I’ve got a big scheme planned for tomorrow, you don’t need to be… to be tired…”

Perry nodded, and stood, backing away a step or two before turning and- well, fleeing.

As he closed the door, he heard Dr. D’s unmistakeable cry of “Good night, Perry the Platypus!”

-/-

Candace was up when he got home, standing in front of the open fridge eating shredded cheese straight from the package. She startled when he clicked the door closed behind him, and then turned and gave him a sheepish smile.

“Hi, Uncle Perry. What are you doing out so late?”

He shrugged, and punctuated this with a pointed look at the cheese.

“I was hungry.”

Perry looked over at the plates in the drainer.

“...I didn’t want to dirty any dishes.” She shoved one last handful of cheese into her mouth and closed the fridge. “Hey Uncle Perry, can I talk to you?”

(Though, since she said it through a mouthful of cheese, it came out more like “Hey ummmfml Peffffff, can I talk to you?”, made clearer after she sprayed half a mouthful of cheese onto the floor. Fortunately, Perry was pretty well-versed in incomprehensible conversation.)

Perry nodded, and held out both hands open in invitation.

“Um, well, I kind of have a really personal question, and you don’t have to answer it but, um… how did you know, when you knew you were gay?”

Perry stilled. He had  _ wondered _ if any of his kids were ever going to ask him that, but now that the moment had come, he wasn’t sure how to answer. It was a complicated experience, one he wasn’t sure how to explain, and involved information that Candace  _ could not _ be privy to.

That double life again. He took a deep breath, and, “I always knew I liked guys, if that’s what you’re asking. It was never a question, I just, liked guys.”

“Oh…” Whatever answer she’d wanted, it wasn’t this one. “So… it wasn’t some, like, epiphany? Some big huge moment where you were all ‘I think I like boys now’?”

Perry shook his head, then gave her a knowing smile. “Do you like girls now?”

“No! I mean… I don’t know. Maybe?” She groaned, and he opened his arms automatically when she planked in despair, letting her fold herself weightless against him. “I met this girl at that thing Mom and I did and she was… I don’t know, really pretty… and nice… and she  _ got _ me, and it was just… I don’t know…”

Again, saying this with her face pressed against his front meant that most of it was muffled and unintelligible, but Perry got the gist of it, and patted her head.

“I’m a mess,” she mumbled.

“No, love, you’re fine.”

“Kay.”

-/-

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> One thing that happened when I started writing this verse is that it turns out I have a _lot_ of feelings about Candace. Unfortunately I don't have room to really explore them in the mainline fics, but I'm hoping to do some other side stuff. We'll see what happens. That said, there is gonna be a background plot across the mainline about Candace exploring her sexuality, so that should be fun. (Or to put it another way, "I think I like girls now.")


	3. Expanse

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Reassignment doesn't go well for either of them.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> In which Perry completely fails to have the titular epiphany. Strap in, folks, this is the end of the first part of this series.
> 
> That fraternization rule is actually going to get in the way of some of my plans. I may have written myself into a corner a bit.

-/-

“ _ So come home Perry, come home Perry come home _ ~“

Ah, jeez, these kids were going to be the end of him. Perry scrubbed away tears already pooling, and schooled his face into the most casual expression he could. He shoved his hands into his pockets- casual, casual- and stepped onto the roof.

“Hey guys, what’d I miss?” he said-

“Uncle Perry!”

-and found himself almost immediately at the bottom of a pile of kids.

“You came back,” Phineas said, squeezing best his tiny arms could manage.

Perry chuckled, and ruffled his hair fondly. There were too many people around- too many strangers- so his explanation would have to wait, but there was no reason he couldn’t enjoy this reunion in the meantime.

-/-

“So you  _ weren’t _ planning to leave forever?” Phineas asked later, the group sitting around the table eating pie while Perry explained where he’d disappeared to.

“Phin, I was gone for twelve hours.”

“Well, yeah, but…” Phineas pushed his pie around his plate, not looking up to meet Perry’s eye. “You took all your stuff with you. We thought that… you’d left…”

“I took a duffle because I thought I’d be gone a few days,” Perry corrected. “Turns out that’s most of what I own.”

“But where did you  _ go _ ?”

Perry had prepared his explanation ahead of time, fortunately. “I had a family emergency come up. I had to leave quickly, and I didn’t want to wake everyone. I meant to call once I knew what was going on, but by the time I knew more it looked like I’d be back by tomorrow at the latest, so there was no need to.” He gave them all a sheepish smile. “Didn’t know I cause such an uproar.”

Linda came over to join them, bringing more pie as she did. “Is everything okay with your family now?”

He nodded. It was a thin excuse, but hopefully they wouldn’t delve too much into it.

There was a touch at his elbow, and he turned to find Candace standing behind him, curled in on herself with nerves. “So you didn’t leave because of what I said?”

His eyes widened. He held out one arm and pulled her to him. “Course not, love, never.” He looked around- Phineas still refused to look up; Ferb hadn’t touched his pie. He reached out his other arm and pulled both boys to him as well, clinging to all three of them. “Listen. Sometimes things might come up that I have to leave for a bit, but I’ll always do my best to come back to you.”

“Promise?”

He nodded.

“Cross your heart,” Ferb ordered.

Fair enough. He let go of them and made a solemn heart-crossing motion, and then opened his arms again just in time to catch all three of them as they flung themselves back at him.

-/-

There was just one last loose end to tie up. Perry told his family he was going out, and would be home late, and then took off in the direction of the quad-state area.

The tracker on his watch led him to a roadside dinner about halfway between the two areas. He found what he was looking for inside: Dr. D, brooding over a plate of waffles in a back booth.

He looked up when Perry set his helmet on the table, a complete lack of recognition in his eyes, and jabbed a fork at the apparent intruder.

“Listen pal, I don’t care if this is your seat or not, I’m using it now, so… you know, step off, or whatever.”

Perry gave him an unimpressed huff, then set his hat almost daintily on his head. Immediately Dr. D’s impersonal sour look was replaced by a more focused, personally directed sour look.

“Oh. It’s you.”

Perry nodded, and waved at the waitress for a coffee before sitting down. Dr. D glared at him.

“I don’t remember inviting you to join me.”

Perry shrugged.

“Oh, whatever, it’s not like you care.”

Perry gave no reply to that. Coffee was brought. Perry sipped it in habitual silence, watching Dr. D worry at his waffles, occasionally taking a bite but far more often stabbing at them with clear unrest.

“You don’t have any room to be mad about Peter Panda anymore,” he said eventually.

Perry repressed the chittering growl that threatened to bubble out of him. He  _ did _ have room, he had plenty of room, he’d be as mad as he like, but this wasn’t the time or place to hash out an old argument. He settled for a glare instead.

“I  _ mean _ it, Perry the Platypus. You don’t! Not after all  _ this _ . Not after  _ him _ .”

This time he didn’t stop the half-growl from coming out. “I didn’t ask for reassignment.”

“You didn’t exactly fight it, either,” Dr. D sneered. “You didn’t even say goodbye! You just left!” He stabbed at another piece of waffle, and then jabbed his fork at Perry. “I had to find out from a  _ third party _ that my nemesis was leaving to fight a different evil scientist because  _ you _ didn’t care enough to tell me yourself!”

Perry dropped his gaze down to his coffee. Ran his thumb around the rim of the cup while he considered his response.

Dr. D wasn’t done, though. “You told me you  _ liked _ being my nemesis and it wasn’t just a job but the first time you get reassignment you just up and  _ leave _ .”

“I came back,” Perry said softly. He raised his eyes to meet Dr. D’s, willing his nemesis to understand what that meant.

Dr. D rolled his eyes. “Yeah, after  _ I _ helped you. What were you doing still in that trap anyway? You’ve gotten out of  _ way _ worse that I’ve put you in in half the time. What, were you just waiting for the ~right moment~? Because that’s not cool, Perry the Platypus!”

Perry shrugged. It would be impossible to explain the amount of trust he’d put in his nemesis to handle the trap freeing himself, when he’d turned up almost as quickly as Perry had.

“He didn’t even  _ monologue _ ,” Dr. D added, ire slipping away in favor of an almost pleading tone.

Perry smirked. “Yeah, he didn't. Terrible nemesis he would have made.”

Dr. D sighed.  Perry sighed.  There was more silence. More coffee was brought.

“What are you even doing here, Perry the Platypus?” he asked after awhile.

Perry gestured at his helmet, and out the front window at his bike.

“If you were going to offer me a ride home why not just take me back with you before? Why make me walk this far and then come back later?”

“I’m off the clock now,” Perry shrugged.

“Oh.” He poked at his waffles a bit. They were a soggy mess by this point. “Sure  _ Monobrow _ won’t have a problem with this? You coming to pick me up while you’re off the clock?”

“Nothing in the rules against it. I checked.”

“Nice to know I’m not even worth breaking a few rules for.”

Perry shrugged again. He actually ignored or circumvented OWCA regulations a lot, but he didn’t need his nemesis to know about that. Instead he grabbed a fork and helped himself to a bite of Dr. D’s waffles, prompting a squawk of protest.

“Oh, come on, you’re  _ in a diner _ ! If you want food just order some- I’ll even order  _ for you _ so you don’t have to deal with the waitress. Don’t just go grabbing  _ my _ food!”

Perry chuckled, and grabbed another bite.

“You are the  _ worst _ , Perry the Platypus, do you know that? The. Worst.” 

He jabbed his fork at Perry again; Perry just shook his head and reached over to turn the fork back on himself.

“Yeah yeah, oh, you’re so  _ clever _ , aren’t you?” He set his fork down. “Would you have come to pick me up, if it was against the rules?”

Perry nodded, no hesitation. He might have been more subtle about it, but- yes, yes he would.

“I guess that’s  _ something _ , at least.”

Silence fell again. Uncharacteristic of Dr. D, and equally uncharacteristically, it was Perry who broke it.

“We should do this more often.”

“Do what?”

Perry gestured around them, and then between them.

“Pretty sure Monobrow would object if we started hanging out off the clock, Perry the Platypus.”

“Hang ‘im, then,” Perry said. “It’s allowed. Explicitly.”

“Are you kidding me?”

Perry shook his head, and handed Dr. D his copy of the rulebook, open to the relevant page. He pointed at the paragraph on off-the-clock relations between nemeses.

“Huh,” Dr. D said, when he’d finished. “So we can literally have any sort of relationship we want as long as we’re each other’s nemesis?”

Perry nodded.

“Why?”

A shrug.

“No no, don’t give me that- it’s a  _ really weird rule _ , Perry the Platypus. There has to be a  _ reason _ .”

Perry rolled his eyes, and flipped to a different page of the rulebook, the one with rules about dress code- boiled down to they could be completely starkers as long as they wore their hat- then to the page about holiday time- they had to clear the holiday with their nemesis, which was always annoying- and then to the page about which food and drink items were allowed in an agent’s lair, which were, as near as Perry could tell, completely arbitrary.

“All right, I get your point. I guess if I’d spent a quarter-century dealing with all these silly rules I’d stop asking questions too.”

Perry nodded. “I do have a theory.”

“Hit me with it.”

“It’s impossible to spend every day with someone without developing  _ some _ kind of rapport with them. Allowing for an off-duty dynamic reduces the risk of rogue agents.”

“So it’s like an allowance? Oh, wait! I get it! It’s like Ocelot and Dr. Mono!”

What. Perry chittered out a question mark, ears burning.  _ What _ .

“Okay, okay, bear with me, I’m going somewhere with this- they’re the characters in this book I read the other day,  _ Ocelot, Under Covers _ , it’s really g- well no, it’s  _ bad _ , but it’s, I don’t know, it really  _ spoke _ to me, anyway, that’s beside the point, I’m getting away from the point.”

Perry stared. Dr. D must notice his face going red, right? But no, he was off on a tangent, he wasn’t going to notice anything for a good few minutes.

“So, so in the book, Ocelot is this, like  _ secret agent _ , and Dr. Mono is his nemesis, right? Just like us! And they’ve got all this- well,  _ sexual _ tension, but that’s- you know, that’s  _ also _ beside the point, the point is, Ocelot is  _ conflicted _ because he has all these  _ feelings _ about Dr. Mono  _ but _ they’re on either side of the good and evil divide and so it starts to interfere with his  _ job _ , and it’s- okay, full disclosure, it’s like a hundred and sixty pages of  _ really _ bad smut punctuated by a meditation on what it means to be good or evil but, you know, the point is, if Ocelot and Dr. Mono had a rule like  _ this _ Ocelot wouldn’t have been  _ nearly _ so conflicted and they wouldn’t have needed to come up with all those convoluted excuses to just bone.”

Oh god oh god oh god _ oh god oh god  _ **_why_ ** .

“Anyway, what I’m getting at is that  _ we’re _ Ocelot and Dr. Mono! You know, without the sexual tension. Obviously.”

“Obviously,” Perry squeaked out. He stood with a clatter and grabbed his helmet. “Excuse me a second.”

-/-

Perry returned to the table several minutes later, setting his helmet back down. He felt better now.

“You okay, Perry the Platypus?”

Perry nodded.

“Because it’s just that it sounded like you were screaming into your helmet for several minutes straight in the bathroom, is all.”

Perry shrugged.

“All right, fair enough. Sometimes you just gotta scream into your helmet in a bathroom.”

Perry reached over and tapped Dr. D’s hand, then pointed back out at his bike.

Dr. D shrugged. “I guess it is getting late. All right, let’s go.”

-/-

The drive home took an hour and a half, but for how much agony Perry was with Dr. D clinging to his waist, it felt like  _ years _ . By the time he pulled up in front of Doofenshmirtz Evil Incorporated, he’d gone still, enough so that Dr. D gave him a worried look once he’d dismounted.

“I guess I’ll see you tomorrow, Perry the Platypus,” he said, peering close, trying to find  _ something _ to read in Perry’s body language and getting  _ nothing _ . “...good night, Perry the Platypus.”

A beat, and Perry raised his visor so he could give Dr. D a smile before lowering it again and leaving.

-/-

When he got home, it was late enough that the kids were in bed, but Linda and Lawrence were still up, curled up on the couch together watching a movie. They paused it when Perry came in.

“Take care of what you needed to?” Lawrence asked.

He nodded.

“Well that’s good.”

He flashed a thumbs-up, then turned to trudge upstairs.

“Oh, Perry, wait,” Linda said. She reached over and picked up a book off the coffee table. “I finished reading your new book. Could you put it in your room before one of the kids gets ahold of it?”

Perry nodded and took the book, then leveled a questioning look on Linda.

“I liked it,” and, when he continued to stare, “Okay, so I skimmed the dirty bits.”

“The whole thing is dirty bits.”

“I did a lot of skimming. But the  _ story _ was enjoyable. The dynamic between Ocelot and Dr. Mono felt so  _ real _ , you could really feel how much it hurt Ocelot to know that they could never have the the relationship he  _ wanted _ and that they had to fight instead.”

Perry stared down at the book in his hands. Yeah, okay. Sure, why not. “I’m going to bed,” he said, and turned to resume his journey upstairs.

-/-

Perry sat on his bed, staring an accusation at the book sitting in front of him.

Okay, looking at it rationally:

His cover was a writer.

Thanks to Dr. D’s writerinator, he had a body of published work that was, unfortunately, entirely comprised of smut.  _ Bad _ smut, but that was irrelevant.

He’d decided to write a book without the inator, because the experience would help his cover.

Everyone said write what you know, and espionage was what he knew.

When he’d looked up marketable ideas, enemies to lovers, unresolved sexual tension, and kinky bondage porn were all extremely popular tropes.

The line between good and evil was something he had to be constantly asking himself about as a secret agent, it was only natural it would sneak into his writing.

There. Rational. It was mere coincidence that it had turned out a situation that  _ almost _ seemed like his real life, and it only seemed the same on the surface: there was nothing kinky about Dr. D’s traps (and if Perry had put his own trap experiences into writing Dr. Mono’s traps,  _ that was just because that was what he knew _ ). There was nothing UST about their fights. Just because they had a rapport and got along didn’t mean he had some sort of buried feelings.

None of it meant  _ anything _ . It was a  _ coincidence _ . It  _ had to be _ . It had to be a coincidence, because if it wasn’t-

_ “Anyway, what I’m getting at is that  _ **_we’re_ ** _ Ocelot and Dr. Mono!” _

-that would mean he had feelings for Dr. Doofenshmirtz. And  _ that _ didn’t bear thinking about.

(And he was sure if he thought about it long enough, he could rationalize why that was so, too.)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Rationalize away, Perry...
> 
> Next fic is gonna take longer; it's the Second Dimension rewrite and since the entire setting is different I'm rewriting pretty much the whole thing so it's gonna take awhile to get through. (Especially since I'm gonna try to get it into less than ten thousand words for some reason.)
> 
> On the bright side, it's also the one that forces Perry to realize he really does have a crush, so maybe we can get to all that pining I promised. (There is going to be so much pining.)
> 
> When Candace refers to "what I said", she means that after the day's events, which he was partially around for, he told Linda that he was sleeping the whole time and saw nothing, and Candace, annoyed, snapped "Why do you even live here?", and later thought he'd left because of her. She didn't mean it, and Perry knew that, but having that followed by his disappearance made it easy to believe she'd driven him off.

**Author's Note:**

> Perry T Platypus! His civilian self is a less-kempt variant of his work outfit; Monogram still doesn't know how he does up his tie so fast.
> 
>  
> 
> [Agent P and Perry T](http://grifalinas.tumblr.com/post/183623794809/i-wasnt-gonna-post-this-yet-but-either-tumble-or)  
> [Some screenshot redraws](http://grifalinas.tumblr.com/post/183642529264/i-redrew-some-perry-screenshots-as-perry-t-and-in)  
> [Perry T in various costumes](http://grifalinas.tumblr.com/post/183809534849/the-only-reason-i-havent-done-more-of-these-is)
> 
>  
> 
> Like this? Want to see more? Hit me up on Tumblr @grifalinas! Hope to see you there~


End file.
